


don't read the last page (but i stay)

by twoheadlights (fizzfic)



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, New Year's Eve, New Year's Kiss, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, everyone say thank u taylor swift
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-01-03
Packaged: 2019-10-03 15:53:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17287022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fizzfic/pseuds/twoheadlights
Summary: "I was thinking about how everybody talks and thinks about who you kiss at midnight. But I think there's something even more romantic about who's gonna deal with you on New Year's Day. Who's willing to give you Advil and clean up the house? I think that states more of a permanence."





	don't read the last page (but i stay)

**Author's Note:**

> happy 2019! i hope everyone had a wonderful and safe new year's day :D
> 
> this is a little late but i hope i still made the cut-off for the acceptable time to post a nye fic hehe
> 
> in case you're wondering my resolution this year is to write and post more bc i want to get back into it and have so many wips just WAITING to be finished and!!!!! yeah
> 
> hope u like this!!!
> 
> title of course is from new year's day by taylor swift
> 
> PS!!!!! thank u as always to charlotte the best beta ever for looking over this also she has [a fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17242148) out that u should def read (love u danhoweiis)

**new years eve, 2009**

 

Phil watches as someone who he knows is Dan but doesn’t seem like it walks around the house, clapping people on their backs and laughing too loudly, talking animatedly about things, waving his arms around, threatening the Malibu in his hand to spill. He’s in love.

He sips his drink slowly, thinking back to their conversation when they’d met each other at the station. Dan told him about the fans who got excited about him meeting Phil and how _strange_ that was. They didn’t even know anything about Dan and Phil being like, together. Their friends, even the ones who don’t know do it too, but...they’re friends. It’s kind of nice, but in a weird, _weird_ way, he decides. Kind of like him obsessing over Buffy and Spike’s relationship in seasons 6 and 7 (or maybe Willow and Tara).

“ _Phiiiil_!” The voice comes from a little to his left, and it’s Hatti, who he hasn’t seen in so long. He laughs and goes over to her, hugging her, almost choking because of her death grip. “Oh, it’s _so_ good to see you!”

“You too!” Phil replies, sizing her up. She’s practically glowing, like Hatti does with her too-loud laugh and bouncy hair. She lives in Manchester but they hardly ever get to see each other because she’s always doing some kind of project or another and he...well, he spends all his free time with Dan. And that’s not a bad thing, is it? Dan’s his best friend and now that his parents know about Phil and who he is (kind of), they’re being less strict about them meeting each other. He _loves_ seeing Dan, and being able to touch him and kiss him and…

Hatti’s doubled over and groaning. “I think I’m gonna—” She chokes out.

Phil’s eyes widen and he jerks into action, grabbing Hatti and rushing her upstairs where he knows there’s a bathroom – thankfully empty. He waits while she retches into the toilet, recoiling a bit at the smell, but not leaving until she stops shaking. “Thanks.” She whispers, as he steadies her.

He smiles. “No problem-o. D’you think you’ll be fine on your own? I’ve lost Dan and he was downing a whole bottle of something last I saw him.”

Hatti smirks. “Go on then,” she tells him. “Look for your boy, save him too.”

Phil doesn’t wait to analyse what that meant and rushes off to the lounge of people. He spots Dan’s maroon shirt (which somehow stands out, even amongst all the black t-shirts and similar fringes. He’s sat on the floor, laughing at someone, recording him. Phil watches (walking steadily towards them) as Dan gulps down the rum quickly. He reaches them and Dan, seeing him, waves.

“Phil! Come over ‘ere!” Phil sits next to Dan, squeezing himself between him and a sofa. He looks at Dan, whose eyes have gone a little glassy but he seems to be in a good mood, so...good. He knows from the Halloween gathering that Dan really can’t handle his alcohol when it gets too much, but thankfully Phil’s been there every time to keep him alive. “I’m ‘avin’ _so_ much fun.” Dan slurs. He pushes his bottle into Phil’s hand. “Have some! It’s _so_ good! You look like you need some.”

Phil rolls his eyes but sips a little of the drink. Someone comes up to them with a DSLR camera and takes a picture. The flash almost blinds Phil even though the lights are on and he feels dizzy. A clock on the opposite wall tells him it’s 11:05 PM.

He sighs. It’s going to be a long last fifty five minutes of the year.

-

Phil is so angry. He’s never angry, but right now he is. And drunk. Definitely drunk now. He’s followed Dan around the flat, making sure he’s okay, accepting glasses of beer and rum and vodka and all sorts of stuff that will do wonders to his liver, he’s sure (rest in peace, Mr. Liver). Now, he’s kind of watching from afar because Dan has left his hand (metaphorically – they couldn’t hold hands while there were cameras everywhere, not that Phil knew exactly when and why they decided that) and gone to join Gary, Ashlee and someone else whose name Phil had forgotten. They'd tackled Ben and he watches helplessly as everyone cheers them on as they fake-claw at him and kiss his cheek and laugh against his neck. Dan even has the audacity to glance at Phil and smirk before he nuzzles right into the base of Ben’s neck and sucks a dark bruise-like mark on it.

“Hey, you alright?” Someone from his right asks. He nods and gulps. _Not_. The group in front of him breaks apart and he sees Dan climb up on the sofa and yelling incoherently.

Phil sighs and goes to him, like a good caretaker, climbing up himself and Dan smiles at him serenely.

“TEN MORE MINUTES!”

He wonders if they’ll kiss. He wants to. But...the cameras. The _people_ . It’s not that most of them didn’t know, it’s just that they hadn’t seen. Kissing Dan is such a...private thing. And Phil’s always been like that. What he did with people he liked is strictly to be off camera. Oh, but he _really_ wants to do it. He doesn’t recall a time he didn’t kiss someone that actually meant something to him at New Year’s. And well, Dan probably always has, at least for the last three years and that’s...yeah. He wants to do it for Dan. Because they’re...boyfriends. In a relationship. This is what people in relationships do, right?

“Hey,” he whispers in Dan’s ear, because it’s much too loud and it would be dumb to yell what he wants to say. “Come with me.” He grabs Dan at the elbow and helps him down the sofa. He takes the not-empty bottle of Malibu from his hand and gives it to the first person in the way (“Cheers, mate! Wow—”).

“Where’re we _gooiing_?” Dan whines, still letting himself be dragged through the half-empty corridor.

Phil doesn’t answer, just keeps an eye out for the bedroom he’d seen...aha! He opens the ajar door and sees that it’s empty so he leads Dan to the bed and sits him down. He kneels down in front of him and smiles. It’s dark, except for the moonlight coming in from the window.

“We’re going to have sex?” Dan inquires, furrowing his brow.

Phil shakes his head. Gone are the days he fucks someone in a stranger’s bed. “Just waiting.”

“For what?”

“THREE MINUTES!”

Dan’s eyes widen. “I didn’t think—”

“I wanted to, y’know, since it’s our first together and I dunno, it’s sweet, right?”

“I want to kiss you, but we can’t until midnight. Ugh.”

They look at each other silently. Dan looks paler in the light, almost the same as Phil. It’s eerie, because there’s hardly ever silence when they’re together. They always talk, at the same pace, never not knowing what to reply to each other with. But this quiet is comforting and they can hear faint counting down. Less than a minute.

And he doesn’t know how, but Phil hears the final numbers and he moves to sit next to Dan, putting a hand on his knee. He leans toward him (" _T_ _en! Nine! Eight!_ ”) and closes his eyes. He can sense Dan coming in closer too and it’s like he can’t breathe.

Dan is the one who closes the distance between them as everyone shouts, “Happy new year!”, confidently, pulling Phil in by the waist, surprising him. It seems like they kiss for months, like they’ve just spent most of the new year doing just this and he doesn’t mind, really. He can’t hear anything from outside London, but thank God; imagine having to stop kissing because they were interrupted by fireworks.

 

 

**new year's day, present day**

 

Phil’s the first one to get up, a rarer occurrence with each year passing. He rubs his eyes and blinks up at the ceiling before remembering the events of the previous night.  

He and Dan never did this. They didn’t invite loads of people over for a party - mostly because they didn’t care about enough people to do that. But they’d just been on tour with some of the coolest and funnest group, and they had family and some old friends who’d stayed loyal.

So a new year’s party.

As far as he can remember, it was very sophisticated fun, but of course with a Dan and Phil twist.

He doesn’t really get up, just blinks at the ceiling. He can feel a warm body on his right and that brings a smile to his face. He turns and sees Dan fast asleep, his mouth slightly hung open, a bit of drool on the side. He leans over and kisses his cheek softly, not lingering. There’s work to be done.

He gets off the bed, his feet touching cold wooden floor. He can hear some shuffling downstairs, but he’s not worried. Phil’s been to enough house parties to know of stray guests who sleep over and sneak out the next morning to avoid being part of the clean-up crew. He can respect that. So instead, he makes his way to the en suite to wash up. If he’s being honest with himself, all he wants to do is go back to bed and curl into Dan’s arms and go back to sleep, but he’s up and he has a golden opportunity - to gloat about being up and about before his boyfriend.

The previous night shows in Phil’s reflection; he’s put on his glasses but he can still see the bags under his eyes. There is chunky glitter on his cheeks and his hair is so greasy from all the sweat and possibly champagne that got in it from popping the bottle at 1am. The shirt he’s wearing is missing a few of the top buttons and that’s just...fun, isn’t it? He doesn’t feel like throwing up though, which is always a good sign.

Every cloud has a silver lining.

-

“Ugh.”

Phil looks up from the ground, where he’s scrubbing some suspicious pink shit from the floor, to see Dan walk into the lounge. He looks like he’s been up for a while, but exhausted. He’s still squinting at the light coming in through their balcony.

“Morning, Daniel,” Phil says cheerily. “I take it you _didn’t_ notice the painkiller I left for you on the bedside table.”

“Oh, my absolute _angel_ ,” Dan replies and immediately turns back around presumably to run to the room to take mentioned painkiller.

Phil continues scrubbing, simultaneously dreading cleaning up the rest of the house. He _knows_ he asked people to throw their bottles and cups into the strategically placed garbage black bags around the flat, but apparently people forget that kind of stuff. It’s fine though, because Dan is more of a meticulous cleaner than he is and will probably end up doing a lot more than him when he’s useful and less hungover.

He’s grateful for it. The domesticity. He enjoyed buying all the party essentials the day before. He liked decorating and blowing up balloons and putting up banners, setting down snacks and drinks. Phil likes being a host. Makes him feel all adult (no one mention how he’s thirty one going on thirty two).

Dan joins him and together, they pick up all the beer cans and bottles, the red cups, and plates with pizza crusts on them (“why would they waste a perfectly good crust like that?” Dan laments. “We need to stop associating ourselves with people like this, Phil”).

Dan gasps suddenly. “Phil, look at this!”

“What is this?”

Dan turns around in his hands are Polaroids. “I think Peej took these.” He says.

They sit on the sofa, knees and thighs squished together. The pictures are all from the previous night obviously - most of them of just Dan and Phil together and individually, but some with the other guests too.

There’s a selfie of them, Phil’s face barely in it, a blurry mess. Dan has a peace sign thrown up, cheesing at the camera, eyes closed, probably because of the flash. There’s one of them with Pj and Sophie, and Phil can vaguely remember this one, because their expressions in the photo are so cheeky - while they have Pj standing in between them, they definitely have their fingers intertwined behind his back.

“Gross,” Dan mumbles, but he’s smiling. Phil kisses his cheek. “Gross,” he repeats, this time wrinkling his nose.

The third picture is of the two of them with their arms around each other’s waists but Phil’s face has disappeared at Dan’s neck where he’s kissing him and Dan has a red cup in his free hand and his expression is that of an exaggerated orgasm face (or the face he makes when he eats really good steak). “Speaking of which,” Phil says, laughing.

They spend a good twenty minutes just looking through the pictures and talking about the night and congratulating each other on what seemed like was a hit. They _can_ remember most of it - Phil can still hear laughter ringing in his ears, Dan’s distinct from the others, he recalls the countdown and Dan’s lips on his as the clock struck midnight.

“Thank God no one threw up,” Dan says.

“I think everyone in our circle is past that phase of getting drunk,” Phil replies.

“That’s so...boring. I love it.”

It definitely would’ve been considered boring by them in the past, especially after the house parties they’d gone to in their youth. Phil jokingly wants to put the picture of Dan from 2010 downing a Malibu next to the Polaroid from this year where he’s sipping champagne from a flute so the stark difference is just even more pronounced. And Phil does this every year: thinking about how far they’ve come and all the things they’ve done and gone through together, hand-in-hand, and how _happy_ he is, and keeps getting, it’s almost too good to be true. He hopes it isn’t. They’ve been talking about moving again, and maybe this year will be the Year of the Forever Home. Maybe not, but he’s the optimist in the relationship. He imagines putting up these Polaroids on the walls of the new place, and in their room, in a frame on the bedside table like he’s seen in the movies.

“We should really finish up the bottles,” Dan says, interrupting his train of thought and visions of playing with their future corgi in the garden with his plants that he won’t kill he _won’t._ “I think I also saw a glittery pump behind a plant pot. Who leaves without one of their shoes?” He continues ranting and then remembers one time he woke up the day after a party with his shirt unbuttoned and hickies on his neck and collarbone and Phil reminds him that was their first New Year’s party together in 2010 at Tom’s place and it’s _perfect_.

**Author's Note:**

> [twt](http://twitter.com/checkyesphil)!


End file.
